Roman Revivalism

Roman Revivalism is an attempt towards a middle path in the current polarized atmosphere of the Neo-Pagan and Polytheist communities, recognizing historical sources while adding the breath of our modern culture to create a vibrant, living, fully immersed spiritual practice, or cultus.

We believe that the Gods exist, and we humans are capable of cultivating a close relationship with Them. In turn, we believe that we answer to the Gods in our private spiritual cultivation, who are able to communicate what They want of us. We believe that They are beings fully capable of Agape, unconditional love, and in turn we approach cultus with piety, reverence, and love instead of treating it as something simply required of us by Them. The Gods do not need us, but They welcome us into Their lives as co-creators, family, and friends.

This outlook on the relationship offered to us by the Gods requires our group to embrace an agreement upon the individual’s right to personal autonomy within their own home practice. This extends to the right of each small group to govern their own festivals, rites, and traditions.

We acknowledge that, if the Roman civilization would have remained a major world power, our interaction with the culture would be as strange to them as that of the Gauls, and therefore we accept that some Roman Revivalists’ approaches may be more Syncretic with modernity than the next. While we, ourselves, are not monotheists, we do not feel it possible to completely erase from our personal culture what monotheism has been associated with. We do not feel it necessary nor desirable to strive for complete recreation of Roman culture or cult practice.

This is a Peoples’ movement. We are the New Aventine. We believe in social justice and inclusion of minorities as equals. For the Gods do not want the lie of pure ethnicity; the Gods want the embrace of all believers willing to extend their hearts and arms. We call for all genders (with their infinite variety) to have equal place within our traditions, both in places of leadership and future mysteries. We shun shunning due to age, economic class, disability, sexual orientation, educational history, or any other state of existence that causes one group to be held above another, including the religion of others.

In the vein of social justice, we encourage local groups to practice a form of social services to the larger Pagan and Polytheist community in their areas. Communal gardens, emergency services, and referrals to faith-friendly professionals are only a few options for finding new ways to embrace our Gods and extend do ut des (I give that you might give) beyond a basic private cultus.

We feel that in this way, by building a strong foundation on the Work of our people, we can build communities that better facilitate the future building of temples and a sustainable positions of those of religious a vocation. We believe that is possible to to co-create peace with both Polytheists and Monotheists, and together we can expand betterment to all areas of society and also bring about the normalization of our faith, allowing us to practice as openly as any mainstream religion safely.

Finally, we believe that we must be the change we wish to see in this world. This means that, collectively, we must seek to get along, to temper our deeply held beliefs with moderation when reacting to those who do not agree, within our small community and beyond to the larger world. To help with this, we encourage our members to not only take an active study in classical philosophy, but to adopt the Roman Virtues as a model for how a Roman should strive to act and react in both the larger world and microcosm of their individual selves and homes.